In this paper Bowlby's theory of attachment and child care will be outlined along with additions from other theorists such as Rutter and Ainsworth. From this we will see how the evolution of the family unit since 1950s has been affected by such theories along with welfare policy and social theorists which have influenced family life and child care practices in the UK. Bowlby described attachment as the bond that develops between a baby and its primary caregiver. It is characterised by the interaction patterns which develop in order to fulfil the infants' needs and emotional development. Bowlby noted the apparent distress in children separated from their mothers in unusual circumstances e.g.
(Bowlby, 1969) Fonagy et al. (1993) sought to empirically test the validity of Bowlby's idea of internal working models. The results they produced supported the concept of internal working models, demonstrating that mothers who had mental representations of insecure attachments with their own parents tended to be less securely attached to their own children. In accordance with the internal working model hypothesis, Bowlby believed that secure and long term relationships with a caregiver was essential to the infants later development. Therefore, any disruption to the attachment bond before the child reaches two years of age will have negative consequences for the future.
In an attempt to portray the complexities of merging old traditions with modern lifestyles, Amy Tan and Chinua Achebe formed novels that depict how parent-child relationships are influenced by different cultures. Though they are presented under different circumstances, The Joy Luck Club and Things Fall Apart portray parent child relationships, the effect of outside influences, cultural differences, and generational gaps. Naturally parents strive to provide what is best for their children which includes, watching over them, giving them proper guidance, and going great lengths to ensure that their future will be better than their own. This motive is shown in The Joy Luck Club in the opening parable, “Feathers from a Thousand Li Away.” A woman who is emigrating to America from Shanghai, dreams that she will raise a daughter who will not only “exceed all hopes,” but unlike her mother she will be “judged according to her own worth not by that of a husband” (TAN) It is also shown in Things Fall Apart when Okonkwo is speaking to his son Nwoye, warning him that, “No matter how prosperous a man was, if he was unable to rule his women and his children (and especially his women) he was not really a man” (ACHEBE, 45) Okonkwo was referring to his father who he resents for not being the man that he desperately needed as a child. As a result of being raised by that type of parenting, Okonkwo’s “whole life was dominated by fear, the fear of failure and weakness.” He is now doing everything in his power to make sure that his son, Nwoye, will not follow after his grandfather’s habits hoping that his son will learn good work ethic and respect for his culture.
First, the formulation of Bowlby's theory will be explained. This will be followed by a presentation of research which enabled the discovery of different forms of attachment. Also factors influencing infant's internal working model such as parental sensitivity and association between early attachment, and later development as well as the concept of transmission of attachment will be discussed. Moreover changes to original theory in light of this research will be examined. According to Bowlby (1973) a strong emotional bond between the mother figure and the infant called attachment has the biological origin.
A weakness in Hodges and Tizard study is that the parents may not have invested the same time emotionally. The biological parent in Hodges and Tizard sample may not have been as interested in their children which are why they were less attached. Although the Czech twins suffered from privation this did demonstrate that a person without a bond could then go on a function adequately in society. Rutter’s study showed that recovery from extreme privation can be achieved given adequate care, although adoption, within the age of two, was still within Bowlby’s sensitive period. The longer the period of privation the harder to
Bowlby's aim was to discover the consequences of difficulties in forming attachments in childhood, and the effects this would have on an infant's later development. Drawing on much work in the psychoanalytic literature, such as that of Freud and Harlow, Bowlby formulated the idea that infants develop a close emotional bond with an attachment figure early in life, and that the success or failure of this earliest of relationships lead the infant to form a mental representation that would have profound effects on their later relationships and their own success as a
When shown together there evidence provided a way of proving how levels of security in these relationships have substantial impact upon infants development. It is important to mention that the “strange situation” technique has received criticisms surrounding ethics with regards to intentionally inflicting distress upon infants by purposely separating them from their attachment figure however it has been argued that this situation is something that does occur naturally in an infants life. The ecological validity of the research and its ability to be generalised within different cultures has also been questioned as the study used only a sample of westernised participants. For Bowlby the IWM only had capacity to change in the period of infancy after this it is fixed for the rest of a persons life therefore a link should be able to be demonstrated between infant attachment classifications and adult attachment classifications. Continuing from the work of Bowlby and Ainsworth the adult attachment interview was developed by Main, here an adults ability to integrate childhood memories of relationships with attachment figures into working models of relationships was assessed identifying in accordance to Main three
The final 12% were ‘insecure-resistant’. They would be uneasy around their mother and upset when she left the room. They tried to resist strangers and were quite difficult to comfort when their mother returned. The study shows that there are significant individual differences between infants attachments (i.e. there are different types of attachments.)
Some sociologists suggests that this change led to more equality in modern family life. However, not everyone agrees with this conclusion. Feminists are especially cautious about drawing this conclusion because they believe that there are still inequalities of power and control which persists in modern family relationships. In Talcott Parsons' 1955 functionalist model of the family, he suggests that in the traditional nuclear family, the roles of husbands and wives were naturally segregated(separate and distinct from one another). Women are naturally more suited to take on the expressive role which involves socialisation of the children and meet the family's emotional needs.
Or perhaps they’ll force a teenager to get a productive job, rather than to lie around the house curled up in a pile on the couch. Sometimes familial pride can drive parents to be a little stricter than average to protect the family’s good name by keeping the child out of dangerous and/or embarrassing situations. Maybe they’d put restrictions on the kind of crowd a member could hang out with, where they could go and at what time, or by nosing into the member’s private life to understand what’s going on. Goodness knows that these efforts by family and parents can really get under a member’s skin. After all, I could name over twenty instances off the top of my head where I’d sat brooding around the house after being told that I couldn’t go to my friend’s or stay out late on a school night.